It was hot. And not just "take your sweater off, you'll be fine once you sit down for a minute" hot, either. It was sweltering, boiling; sweat was pouring off both of us as we urged our bodies to continue on to new extremes.
The two of us were moving together in ways that would've seemed impossible, in more ways than one, a few months ago. His hands wrapped around my waist, lingering there for a moment before I arched my back and spun out of the soft grip, stretching my leg out as far as I could.
The world had disappeared, and my vision had tunneled until all I could see was him and flashes of the room as the two of us moved as one. The majority of our clothing had been abandoned on the floor a while ago, and I wished in my head that it would be acceptable for more to be taken off. I could hear his heavy breathing, and I was sure he could hear mine as we continued.
We had made it past the bridge, and were settling into a final chorus. We collapsed into each other for the finale, and then we were finished.
The music had stopped, and the dance was over.
I turned to Derek, gave him a much-deserved high five, and walked across the studio to where my water bottle had been suffocated by my leg warmers, hoodie, tee shirt, and sweat pants. Allison gave a long applause as we both gulped from our respective water bottles.
"I'm impressed," she told us, a wide smile stretching across her cheeks. "Progress isn't the right word for the two of you. It's more like a miracle."
We both smiled and bowed dramatically. I laughed. "I wouldn't exactly call it a miracle. It's more of an extreme breakthrough."
"So what's the difference between a miracle and an 'extreme breakthrough'?" Derek asked me, using his fingers to create air quotes around the words.
"Miracles don't have an explanation, but breakthroughs can have an explanation, even if it doesn't really make sense," I explained after a pause of thought.
"Well said, Eliza." Allison nodded her approval of my description. "If your dancing career falls through, which I'll be damned if it does, you could have some great success as a writer or public speaker."
I laughed in response.
What had occurred in the dance studio with Derek and me was nothing short of an extreme breakthrough, something that both of us, as well as everyone else thought would need a miracle to fix. When I came back to school after winter break, I didn't know what to expect or do. The first few weeks were terrible. We hated each other, and could hardly stand to be in the same school with each other, let alone the same dance studio, let alone dance together. Classes usually ended in screaming matches, after I had been dropped by what I thought was on purpose or I kicked him by what he thought was on purpose.
And our dance suffered from it. There was no emotion in our duets except hatred, and Allison tried to work with that, choreographing heavy metal hate dances, but when it came down to it, us wanting to kill each other was something that no one wanted to see on stage.
Gradually, though, things got better. We both accepted the fact that neither of us were going to change who we were with or our opinions on certain things, but that didn't have to mean that our dance scores suffered at competition. We agreed to respect each other, put the past in the past, and essentially stop acting like four year-olds. We forgave, compromised, and essentially agreed to fake it until we made it. We still have a long way until we're best buds eating lunch together and getting coffee after rehearsal, but so far, things have been going a lot more smoothly, and friendship is making its way to the both of us.
It's all about balance, balancing the good with the bad, the better with the crappy.
As we collected our things and I relayered myself for the coldness of early April in Connecticut, Allison asked the two of us, "You guys got any big weekend plans?"
